Chapter 19
Skyla
The morning storm hits Paragon like the island personally offended Mother Nature and she’s decided to make us all pay for it.
Rain hammers against the kitchen windows with the fury of a thousand tiny fists, each drop striking glass with enough force to make the entire house shudder.
The wind howls around the eaves like some tortured spirit seeking revenge, and I swear the whole structure sways with each and every gust. It’s the kind of weather that makes you wonder if Paragon is trying to shake us all off like fleas from one very irritated animal—an animal that’s about ready to roar and swallow us all whole.
The Landon house, thankfully, feels like a warm bubble of normalcy against the chaos outside. The scent of coffee mingles with something sweet—blueberry muffins, maybe—and there’s that underlying smell of mold, and whatever cleaning product Mom uses that makes everything smell vaguely like lemons.
I stumble down the stairs in yesterday’s clothes, my hair doing that thing where it looks like I stuck my finger in an electrical socket, and once I take a look around at the house, I immediately know something is off. Not just off—but completely sideways.
Tad sits at the kitchen table with the newspaper spread out like he’s planning a military campaign, except instead of battle plans, there’s a map on top covered in red circles.
His hair sticks up, this way and that, and he’s wearing his “I’d rather be fishing” t-shirt that he reserves for days when he wants the world to know he’s given up on professional appearances.
Mom hovers over his shoulder with an excitement I haven’t seen since she discovered that discount grocery store across town. Her auburn hair is pulled back into a messy bun, and she’s wearing her pink ratty robe with flowers printed all over it, that gives her a quirky fairy godmother appeal.
“The Caribbean package looks divine,” she’s saying, pointing at something on the map with the enthusiasm of someone who just discovered chocolate doesn’t have calories.
I blink. Hard. “Did you just say Caribbean?” I try to think back to a single instance in my life where my mother had uttered that tropical locale’s name.
Drake sits hunched over a bowl of cereal at the bar, shoveling counterfeit Lucky Charms into his mouth as if he’s been shipwrecked for months and just discovered food. His messy brown hair falls across his forehead, but there’s something different about him that I can’t quite put my finger on.
Mia and Melissa sit at the far end of the table, phones glued to their faces as if they’ve been surgically attached—nothing new there, completely ignoring the plates of scrambled eggs and toast in front of them.
Mia’s blonde hair is pulled into a perfect ponytail that probably took an hour to achieve, while Melissa’s dark curls frame her face as she types with the speed of a teenager conducting a very important social media emergency.
“What’s going on?” I ask, sliding into the chaos with all the grace I can muster, considering the fact that I’ve already accepted that nothing will make sense, so I may as well go with it.
“Althorpe says they might be handing out some early retirement packages,” Mom says, her voice giddy with excitement. “And they said those who are interested could start asking about the benefits.”
Tad looks up from his map with a greasy ear-to-ear grin. “That’s right. They’re offering double what I would get if I waited to grow old and die. And if I’m smart, I’ll take it. And when I do, it’s chip’s ahoy and all that other good stuff. Your mother and I are living on a cruise ship.”
I gasp so hard I nearly inhale my own tongue. “But what about us? What about the baby?”
Living on a cruise ship?
What the actual hell? Did this ever happen? Maybe I missed it in one of my angst-riddled moments where I was too paralyzed to get out of bed because Logan or Gage wasn’t paying enough attention to me. Lord knows that happened now and again on a loop. In fact, it’s sort of happening now.
“Baby?” Mom blinks my way.
Every single person in the kitchen turns to stare at me like I just announced I’m joining a convent. The silence is so complete that even the storm outside seems to pause in an effort to listen in.
Mom’s eyes go wide. “Skyla Laurel Messenger—”
“Are you knocked up?” Mia flies across the kitchen as if she’s been launched from a catapult, her phone long-forgotten as she descends on me with the intensity of a hawk spotting prey.
Aww, she abandoned her phone for me. I guess she really does love me—that or she loves the potential gossip I’m about to provide. And I know for a fact it’s the latter.
A breath gets caught in my throat. Oh wait, so they all think I am definitely not qualified to join a convent. I have never been on the same page with these people.
I inch backward, hands up in surrender. “What? No! I mean your baby.” I point frantically at my mother’s floral belly. “Mom’s baby. The one that’s supposed to—”
Mom starts laughing as if I just delivered the punchline straight to her uterus. “Oh honey, if Tad retires, I’m all done having kids. I’ll hang up my ovaries tomorrow if it means getting my cruise groove on. I’ve always wanted to sail in luxury Landon style.”
My mouth falls open at the thought. The words luxury and Landon definitely do not belong in the same sentence, let alone the same thought process. We’re talking about a family that considers Spam a delicacy and thinks a night out means going to the grocery store after six P.M.
I grab a blueberry muffin from the counter and sink into the chair next to Drake, my brain trying to process this alternate reality version of my family. That’s when I notice what’s been bothering me about Drake’s appearance.
“What are you wearing?” I ask because my goofy, more than a little awkward stepbrother is currently sporting a black leather jacket with enough chains to secure a motorcycle to a telephone pole.
From what I remember about Drake’s teenage years, he was far more interested in old sweatshirts than he ever was in leather.
He tips his head, and the new bad-boy aesthetic makes his widow’s peak look like he’s auditioning for a vampire movie. “Let’s just say you inspired me. I drove by the thrift store last night and picked it up.”
I inch back in my chair. “I inspired you to turn into the leader of some discount biker gang?”
“You know what?” He nods into the lunacy.
“A motorcycle might just be the next logical step. Thanks.” His grin is nothing but sharp edges and rebellion.
“And yeah, you inspired me. Bree says you told her we were going to get hitched one day.” The irritation that crosses his face is immediate and almost cartoonish.
“Why the heck would you tell her that? It’s like you’re single-handedly trying to wreck my game.
If word gets out that I’m supposedly going to marry Brielle Johnson one day, I’ll never land another girl again.
Do you know what that means? I’ll be stuck with Bree for the rest of my life! ”
“Stuck with Bree?” The words come out sharper than I intended, because Brielle is one of the sweetest, kindest, funniest people on the planet, and the idea that Drake considers being with her some kind of punishment makes my blood pressure spike.
Sure, Drake is a career idiot, but he’s also a teenager so I decide to let it slide.
“I don’t need no old lady weighing me down,” Drake continues, apparently oblivious to the fact that he just insulted his future bride, and one of the mothers of his many children.
“Brielle Johnson is officially on my no-fly list. I don’t want anything to do with her now or ever.
In fact, I’m going out there today and hooking up with every chick who isn’t Brielle.
You’re not some dumb prophet, Skyla. And I’ll do whatever it takes to prove you wrong. ”
He gives me the finger and struts out of the kitchen with his head jutting back and forth like a chicken.
Look out, girls. Here he comes. He’ll get the chicks, all right, of the feathered variety.
“What exactly just happened?” I say, letting the muffin slip through my fingers.
“Our dumb brother discovered his inner rebel,” Mia says, not looking up from her phone. “It’s actually kind of hot.”
“Ew, Mia. Just ew.”
“What? It’s not like we’re really related.”
Melissa hits her for good measure, and I’m glad about it because I’m not close enough to reach.
Twenty minutes later, we’re all piled into Mom’s ancient minivan, which makes alarming grinding noises every time she shifts gears.
Somewhere behind the Olivers’ house sits a perfectly good Mustang, which Logan and Gage gifted to me, but at this point in time, I still don’t have my license and, to be honest, the DMV is the last circle of Hell I want to conquer.
I think I’ll let the original version who belongs here handle that one.
The storm has calmed to a steady downpour that turns the world outside into another watercolor painting, with blurred edges and colors running together that make a morbid rainbow.
I press my hand to the rain-streaked window and try to make sense of what’s happening.
The mysterious retirement package that never existed before.
Mom’s sudden aversion to having more children.
That alone is enough to ring every alarm bell in existence, never mind Drake’s transformation into a leather-clad bad boy.
And Aunt Karen and her threat to spike her stilettos on Paragon soil?
None of this has happened before. None of this is supposed to be happening now.
My stomach churns with a growing certainty that something is very, very wrong.
Every small change feels like a thread being pulled from the tapestry of time, and I can’t shake the feeling that if enough threads get pulled, the whole universe is going to unravel.
At least mine. And quite possibly for everyone else who lives on this overgrown rock.
The question is, how much can change before the future I know, the future I need—disappears entirely? Of course, they say it can’t happen, but if that’s true, how can everything be so sideways at once and still have no effect?
Yet, according to the logic and rules of time traveling, nothing can truly change. We cannot alter the future.
Too bad nobody told that to the ones I love, who seem hell-bent on proving that every rule has an exception.